With various advances in computer and networking technologies, mobile computing devices have become smaller, more powerful, full-featured, and omnipresent. In fact, for many working professionals, mobile computing devices such as mobile handsets (e.g., smart phones) or tablet computing devices have become the device of choice for everyday computing tasks. Despite the vastly improved performance and feature sets of smart phones and tablet computing devices, reliance on these mobile computing devices as one's primary computing device still presents a variety of problems and technical challenges.
One frequently occurring problem involves using one of these mobile computing devices with a web conferencing service to demonstrate the look, feel and functionality of a software application executing on a desktop computer. For instance, various enterprise software applications are designed to reside and execute on desktop computers. Invoking a web conferencing session from the desktop computer on which the enterprise software application is residing and executing allows a web conference host to share his or her screen and thereby easily demonstrate the features and functionality of the enterprise software application to participants in the web conferencing session. However, when a person is away from the desktop computer on which the enterprise software application is residing and executing, and is using a smart phone or tablet computing device as his or her primary computing device, demonstrating how the enterprise desktop application operates via a web-based conferencing service provides a variety of challenges, some of which are described below in connection with the description of FIG. 1.
FIG. 1 illustrates a conventional approach to using a mobile computing device (e.g., such as a tablet computer 10) to demonstrate to participants in a web conferencing session the look, feel and functionality of a software application residing and executing on a computer 16 that is remote from the mobile computing device 10. As illustrated in FIG. 1, a first participant referred to as the web conference host 12 is shown to be operating a mobile computing device (e.g., tablet computer 10). In addition, as indicated by the dotted line with reference number 14, the web conference host 12 is authorized to use a remote desktop computer 16 on which resides an enterprise software application. In order to demonstrate to various web conference participants the look, feel and functionality of the enterprise software application executing on the desktop computer 16, the web conference host 12 first invokes a web conferencing application on the tablet computer 10. For instance, using a tablet-based web conferencing application, the host specifies the participants to be invited to the web conference, communicates invitations to the participants, and then initiates the web conferencing session with the server hosting the web conferencing service 18. Accordingly, with the web conferencing application residing on the tablet computer 10, the web conference host 12 establishes a web conferencing session with one or more remote participants 20, 22 and 24. This operation is represented in FIG. 1 by the line (with reference number 1 enclosed in a circle) connecting the tablet computer 10 to the server executing the web conferencing service 18.
Next, the web conference host 12 uses a second application residing and executing at the tablet computer 10 to establish a remote desktop connection with the remote desktop computer 16 on which the enterprise software application is residing and executing. This operation is represented in FIG. 1 by the line (with reference number 2 enclosed in a circle) connecting the tablet computer 10 with the remote desktop computer 16. The remote desktop connection enables the web conference host 12 to use the touch screen display of the tablet computer 10 to view and interact with the desktop interface of the remote desktop computer 16. Accordingly, once the remote desktop connection is established, the web conference host 12 can use the input mechanisms of the tablet computer 10 to manipulate the interfaces of various software applications residing and executing at the remote desktop computer 16, including the software application to be demonstrated.
Finally, using the remote desktop connection between the tablet computer 10 and the remote desktop computer 16, the web conference host 12 invokes a web conferencing application on the remote desktop computer 16, and causes the remote desktop computer 16 to join the web conferencing session as a participant. The line with reference number 3 enclosed in a circle represents this operation. By manipulating the settings of the web conferencing application, either at the tablet computer 10 or at the remote desktop computer 16, the web conference host 12 can select the screen of the remote desktop computer 16 to be broadcast to all participants in the web conferencing session. Consequently, when the web conference host 12 uses the remote desktop connection between the tablet computer 10 and the remote desktop computer 16 to manipulate the interface of the enterprise software application residing and executing at the remote desktop computer 16, the user interface of the enterprise software application is broadcast via the screen sharing feature of the web conferencing service 18 to all web conference participants, including remote participants 20, 22, and 24.
Although the above-described technique generally achieves the desired objective—that is, sharing or broadcasting the screen of the remote desktop computer 16 while the web conference host 12 manipulates the interface of the enterprise software application—a number of problems arise with this general approach and technique. First, the remote desktop application residing and executing at the tablet computer 10 generally does not provide an optimal interface for manipulating the user interface of the software applications residing and executing on the remote desktop computer 16. Specifically, tablet computers with touch screen displays that rely primarily on a touch interface as a means of receiving user input do not provide very good control over desktop applications that generally rely on receiving input via a pointing device (e.g., computer mouse, or track pad) and/or keyboard. Second, because the web conference host 10 must establish and manage the web conference via a first tablet-based application, and then establish and manage the remote desktop session through a second tablet-based application, the web conference host 12 is required to switch back and forth between the two applications, as necessary, to perform the required tasks. With many mobile computing devices, switching back and forth between applications, if possible at all, is a time consuming and clunky process at best. Finally, as the tablet computer 10 is required to establish separate communication sessions for both the web conferencing application and the remote desktop application, this technique for screen sharing requires that significant network bandwidth be available to the tablet computer 10. Because the tablet computer is mobile and may be located where wireless network access and bandwidth are limited, the bandwidth requirements for establishing and supporting both communication sessions may be difficult to satisfy.